


those in glass houses

by vois



Series: office au [1]
Category: Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu | The Legend of the Legendary Heroes
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Denyuuden AU Week 2020, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:42:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24723241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vois/pseuds/vois
Summary: There's a new transfer at Claugh's company, and Calne's just elated. Think of the new scandals, Claugh! Think of the fresh gossip!Claugh, though? Claugh is all too aware of the fact that someone has to transferoutbefore someone else can transferin.
Relationships: Claugh Klom & Calne Kaiwal, Sion Astal/Ryner Lute
Series: office au [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1787533
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	those in glass houses

When Claugh woke up, Luke had already left the house. He'd left behind some sticky notes that Claugh couldn't be bothered to read, because no amount of smiley-faces could make the morning better when Luke wasn’t there.

Because this meant the first face Claugh saw that morning would be Calne's. And the first voice he heard would also be Calne's. 

“Guess what, guess what?”

“What,” Claugh said, and briefly wondered if he should have read Luke's notes after all. It might have helped him put up with his coworker this early in the morning.

Or, more likely, it was a smug taunt about how Claugh could sleep through anything, and also mocking his taste in coffee, and would have just made his mood worse. Yeah, definitely not worth reading. The glimpse of a smile would suffice to keep him going.

Calne kept fluttering his hands and circling him like a really, really obnoxious gnat. “There's a transfer,” he said, and his voice was practically a coo. Claugh mentally upgraded him to the world's worst pigeon.

“So what,” Claugh said.

“So - so what? Claugh! What is  _ wrong _ with you,” Calne sputtered. He made a big show of shaking his head and tut-tutting as he wagged his finger just out of biting range. “I'm so disappointed, Claugh, don't you see what this means?! I thought you, of all people, would understand the opportunity that this brings - ”

The opportunity for what, exactly? The loss here far outweighed whatever jokes they could explore. And Claugh already knew about the transfer, anyways - in order to make room for a newbie, someone had to leave in the first place.

If Calne was trying to cheer him up or something, he was doing a shit job. But at least he wasn’t trying too hard to rub it in.

“If it's a woman,” Calne started, and Claugh cut him off before he could get too far with his drooling. “It's not. Luke told me.”

“Oh, boo. Ruin all my fun, why don't you.”

A pause.

“ _ Luke _ told you, huh?”

Claugh gave him a warning glance, but that just seemed to power him up. Calne's annoying grin tripled in wattage. “So, what else have you been talking about with  _ Mr. Luke _ \- ”

"Shut uuuuupp!!"

By the time they emerged on their floor, five flights of stairs later, Calne was still in a headlock and both of them were thoroughly out of breath. It had been worth it, though. If they'd taken the elevator he wouldn't have gotten to ruin Calne's fancy new shoes by dragging him up the stairs faster than his stubby little legs could go.

"These were designer," Calne whined.

"Oh, shut up."

"How could you!"

"Maybe if you hadn't mouthed off," Claugh said, and gave him a last firm shake before letting him go. 

Calne rammed his foot into Claugh's toes.

Five minutes later, Claugh had just given up on trying to strangle the squirmy bastard against the wall and was just pinning him there instead. He tightened his fist in Calne’s hair while Calne whined and whined. Then someone coughed behind them.

Claugh didn’t bother looking. He already knew what the new guy looked like, Luke had shown him a picture of them together at some cafe with his intern. No one else in the office would react to seeing him and Calne tussle like this, so it had to be a stranger.

“Uh,” the new guy said. “I need to... grab something from the printer.”

“Yeah, Claugh, he needs to grab something from the printer,” Calne sing-songed. “Stop blocking up the hallway with your big, enormous, super shapely - ”

"Uhhhhh!! You know what, I'm sure it can wait," the new guy said, and then beat a hasty retreat.

Maybe it was because he hadn't had any coffee that morning, no thanks to Luke, but it took Claugh a few moments to process.

He had Calne against the wall, and they were both pretty messed up from the haul up the stairs. Ruffled hair, rumpled clothes, the works. From the way Calne started snickering when he jumped back, he knew it, too.

“Too late,” Calne said, with far too much glee. “He totally thinks we're in a  _ scandalous office romance _ . And that you’ve got a big dick, look at you, you should thank me! You like brunettes, right?”

“Two women is not a trend no matter how much you want it to be,” Claugh said, sick of that argument, and then, “I don’t like men! That’s a man there, we talked about this already! A ma-a-an!”

“You’re so moody today,” Calne cried, sidestepping when Claugh swung his arms out. “Well, maybe I’ll go talk to the new guy about our  _ scandalous office romance _ instead of putting up with this! Maybe I’ll tell him that you’re abusing poor wittle me, even!”

“Are you - are you trying to train him into your new gossip partner or something?”  _ Already? _ “That's not going to work, I mean, look at the guy.”

He was long gone by now, but the replacement would seem dull even without Luke to live up to. His face was boring and he slouched like he was trying to get rid of his spine entirely.

“You can't just say something like that, he could have hidden depths,” Calne argued. Or started to argue. Because when he opened his mouth again, he just sighed.

“And here I'd been so excited,” he mourned. “It could have been a sexy lady. It could have been some mysterious guy with lady troubles and sexy mafia hounding him, and both would track him down here... But no, we got this boring guy, and his wife's definitely just as boring, too, who else would marry him…”

“Huh? His wife?”

Calne sighed exaggeratedly, and then tried to give him puppy-dog eyes. What the hell.

“And, and I'm going to have such a hard time training a boring guy like him up into a proper partner in gossip crime, since it looks like I need a new one after all…!” He placed the back of his hand on his forehead, like he was going to swoon from misery. “My previous one is completely losing it... seriously, Claugh, didn't you notice?”

“Ugh, get to it.”

“Claugh, Claugh,  _ Claugh _ . He was wearing a  _ ring _ !”

-

The next time Claugh bumped into Luke’s replacement wasn’t somewhere normal like the water cooler or even the printer. It was at Sion’s office. And, Claugh noted, he was in fact wearing a ring.

Not that he’d expected Calne to lie about that kind of thing, but he’d gotten his leg pulled enough times before.

But it only took about two minutes for Claugh to start feeling really bad for the guy’s wife, because he was really obviously into men. Or maybe Calne was wrong and it was a husband? In which case Claugh still felt bad, because he was really obviously into  _ Sion _ .

He hadn’t expected this Ryner guy to be such a smooth flirt, though. From his boring face to his perpetual slouch, Claugh would have pegged him as one of those guys to either totally clam up or stammer and fall on his face. But the way Ryner’s fingers brushed over the back of Sion’s hands, the way that Ryner smiled lazily with half-lidded eyes, even the way he shrugged his shoulders - more like a roll, really - and laughed when Sion handed him another folder… yeah, this guy was a master flirt.

And he was using all of it to put moves on Sion.

Calne was usually the target for this kind of thing, even if his suitors were usually women, but it did make sense. Ryner probably thought that Calne was too wrapped up with - ugh - him. Froaude and that Lucile guy were both really scary. Miller was old, everyone on floor six was completely insufferably  _ boring _ , and Luke was…

Right. Luke wasn’t here anymore. That was why this bastard was here in the first place.

Still, that didn’t mean that Claugh had to sit and watch this. He knocked once on Sion’s fancy glass door and then pushed his way in. Sion was actually mid-laugh when he did, which was… weird.

He wasn’t, like, falling for it or anything, right? He couldn’t be.

Ryner left. Papers exchanged hands. The light hit the diamond on Sion’s wedding band and scattered across the desk.

It was really fancy. Platinum, elegant cut, luxe but unobtrusive. In Claugh’s opinion, it reflected Sion’s personality really well. It wasn’t anything like Ryner or his ring, either. In comparison, Ryner’s had been really plain and worn. But that meant… that meant he’d probably had it a long time. 

If Ryner had been married for so long, why had he been touching his manager’s shoulder like that? Why go after a guy like Sion in the first place when they seemed so different?

Well, maybe that was the appeal of it, actually. Claugh bumped shoulders with him on the way in, and then made sure to keep bumping into him for most of the next week. 

But, he didn’t stop flirting! If anything it was escalating. It almost made Claugh want to ask about Sion’s wife right in front of him, but even he realized that was a bit much.

Actually… it was strange to think of it, but hadn’t Sion been talking a lot less about that woman of his ever since Ryner showed up?

He could give Sion the benefit of the doubt and say that he’d just been busy overseeing the transfer, sure. But it’d been a while by now, and despite the underwhelming impression Ryner gave off Claugh knew he did good work. Besides, half the time Sion would just work himself half to death in silence, but the other half, the half where he ended up taking his work home with him, he’d end up dropping hints about that wife of his, how grateful he was that she’d be waiting for him with a warm meal and a mastery of research spreadsheets…

“...”

Claugh had a pretty bad feeling.

-

Calne burst into Claugh's office.

“Oi, shut the door behind you - hey, those caramels aren't for you!”

“I am  _ distraught, _ ” Calne protested, wild-eyed as he shoved fistfuls of candy down the front of his shirt. Claugh practically threw his chair to the ground as he got up to give chase. “I am  _ appalled _ ,” Calne continued, even as he and Claugh continued to run in circles around Claugh's desk. “I am  _ absolutely  _ \- bwaugh!”

He tripped over Claugh's chair. Not one to pass up an opportunity, Claugh sat on him and shoved a hand down his shirt.

“UHHH.”

“It's exactly what it looks like!” Calne shouted out cheerfully, before Claugh could even finish registering the (not so sleepy-eyed, for once) guy that was standing at the doorway. Not that it mattered, because he ran off before Calne could finish his sentence, which meant there was only one target for Claugh to focus his annoyance on.

“Why you little - “ 

“What! It got him to go away, didn't it!”

“...uh, yeah, but how did you know that I wanted him to go away?”

“Aah? What?” Calne sounded - well, he didn't sound super confused or anything actually, which was good, because whenever he did it meant he was faking. “We can't talk about him if he's right there, Claugh, that's just bad manners. But…” Oh no. What the hell was that face, what did it mean. “Why,  _ Mr. Claugh _ , could it be you have a grudge - ”

Claugh pulls his hand out of Calne's shirt. Then he shoves his other one down it.

“Auuugh! Cold cold cold cold cold!”

“Hah, you baby,” Claugh said, not at all thinking about how Luke had complained about his prosthetic the first time Claugh had bunched up his shirt and run the metal fingers over his chest. But only the first time, and never again afterwards. “Maybe you should have stuck the candies somewhere else. Or better yet, you shouldn’t have grabbed them at all!”

“At least take me to dinner before you let poor Ryner walk in on you fishing taffy out of my pants,” Calne whined, and made a face. “Wait, no, ew, that's pretty gross. Taffy’s gross. Anyways, I’m still distraught.”

“Over what.” Maybe Froaude from floor four had finally managed to seduce - hahaha, no, as if.

“Ryner's wife is, like, a supermodel is why. Duhhh.”

So it was a wife after all, huh? He couldn’t say he’d been expecting that, especially over the last few weeks. But Calne had left himself wide open, and Claugh would gladly take a shot at him to make himself feel better.

“You're saying she’s like twice his age and super wrinkly, aren’t you.”

Calne held up a finger -  _ stop _ . Claugh let it play out. He ate a caramel, then bunched up the wrapper and threw it at Claugh.

"I'm going to ignore that joke about my beloved older ladies," Calne said, "just like how I ignore the firefighter calendar you probably have inside your desk somewhere, and also the sticky note where you have us guys at the office ranked by hotness where I'm at the top and Ryner's at the bottom. I do this because I love you, and also I have my eye on the bigger picture.  _ Ryner has a hot wife _ . We need to - "

"I'm not helping you seduce Ryner's wife," Claugh said, and picked Calne up just so he could make a show of dropping him loudly outside the door.

-

It was worse when he actually met the wife, though. Because it meant he had a face to put to the concept.

She really was like a supermodel, but more importantly…

“That’s Lucile’s sister!” he hissed at Calne. “That big shareholder! How did you not recognize her!”

Calne dug his nails into Claugh’s shoulder and whispered back furiously. “Are you kidding me! I just saw her from behind! With the hair and the figure! I didn’t think she’d be that pretty - ow ow ow ow ow!”

Ryner was giving them that look again, even though they weren’t in a particularly compromising position this time. The lady Eris was also giving them a similar look, though with way more contemplation than Claugh was comfortable with. 

“Your coworkers sure are noisy,” she said. Ryner put a hand over his face.

“I told you not to visit, I tried to spare you from this,” he said. But he was smiling after he said it, and she was smiling too when she made fun of him in response. Why the hell… if she was that pretty, and her brother was such a big figure in the company, and they even made each other smile like that…

That Ryner guy couldn’t have been flirting with Sion for the sake of money or a promotion if he was married to someone that high up. And he didn’t hate her, clearly. They even got along pretty well. Was he just really,  _ really _ into men, then?

That was still pretty shitty of him. And Sion was married, too. Really happily, the kind of thing that used to make Claugh jealous. Why did some people feel the need to drag down everything around with them?

Claugh wasn’t used to feeling this kind of resentment. The last time he’d felt it was… years ago, now, wasn’t it, back before he and Luke had moved in together and Sion wasn’t able to shut up about his blissful life as a newlywed… yeah. Yeah, that was a long time ago, now.

Actually, maybe he’d go ask Sion about that wife of his. Maybe it’d make something around here normal again.

-

There were pictures of Ferris on Ryner’s desk.

There were a lot of pictures of Ferris, actually. Ferris and Ryner making dango. Ferris eating dango. Ferris carrying Ryner on her back. Ryner carrying Ferris on  _ his _ back, albeit reluctantly. There were a  _ lot _ of pictures, seriously. 

It was honestly kind of shocking. There were also a few pictures of them with kids - three different kids, unless there were identical twins somewhere in the mix - and one looked like Ryner, one looked like Ferris, and the third… no, wait, they all looked too old unless he was dealing with a pair of highschool sweethearts. Maybe nieces and nephews or something.

Still, it was… maybe he was overthinking it after all? That was a lot of pictures to put up of someone you weren’t completely gone for. Even Sion didn’t have this many pictures in his office, though that was just because he didn’t have  _ any _ pictures in his office. Froaude, though. Froaude had a pretty comparable collection.

“I need you to check these over and correct them,” Claugh told Ryner, but his eyes were on the photos the whole time. Ryner didn’t seem to notice until a few more moments passed and Claugh was still standing there.

“Uh, dude, you can go,” he said, and Claugh  _ knew _ that, but…

He hadn’t stopped by this room that much at all when Luke was here, had he? What had it even looked like, at the end? What did his new office look like? Did he have this many pictures? He definitely had pictures from outings with those interns, yeah, but did he have any pictures of Claugh?

“Yeah, yeah, just don’t be late with them,” Claugh said, and left.

-

Calne draped himself over the back of Claugh’s seat.

“So, in the latest update,” he droned, “Ferris showed up with a bento for Ryner, they said that they were going to go to some restaurant for dinner, and she left.”

“Yeah? What then.”

“Then… just an hour ago, I heard them going at it in his office. Sion’s office, I mean.” 

Claugh didn’t have to guess who ‘ _ them’ _ meant. Because… the last time he asked about Sion’s wife, Sion had just coughed and looked around nervously. For Ryner, probably. Calne paused a bit for Claugh to say something, but when he didn’t, he continued. “Man, what a weird climate… the mood’s all, like, heavy lately?”

He wasn’t wrong. Even if Claugh knew Calne had pulled it off before, it was still pretty over the top to accuse people of having sex in the office. This went double for Sion, who was their superior. Normally he’d laugh and make fun of Calne’s weird fantasies, but with how the touches and looks had been escalating between Sion and Ryner lately...

Yeah, Claugh could believe it. But even if he didn’t, he wasn’t really in the mood for joking. Actually, maybe no one was. First of all, Luke was gone. This meant a lot of things, but mostly it meant that the latest round of noisy interns was going through floor four instead. Second, they were trying to meet an upcoming deadline, so everyone was considerably more stressed - especially those interns, who couldn’t handle anything, much less an aggravated Froaude breathing down their necks. But most importantly, for all the drama their company tended to cycle through, what with the interns jumping to conclusions and crying their little hearts out and the cute secretaries with bad luck in love and the weird love triangle on floor four… for all the shit they liked to stir up, and the shit they had to put up with, they had never dealt with an actual affair or anything.

Well, not in this building at least. Maybe he’d ask Luke about how his new place compared. Or… not in this building, unless someone was really good at hiding. But Sion wasn’t that someone. Ryner wasn’t that someone, either.

What the hell, Luke really left just for this to take his place? This was shit. It wasn’t just shit timing, it was really just shit. Everywhere and in every way.

“Should we do something?” Calne asked, but he sounded dubious. “I mean, it’s Sion after all…”

They really had to involve all the worst people, too, huh? Sion, their superior, who Claugh had thought loved his wife more than anything. Ferris, the major shareholder’s sister. Ryner didn’t actually matter or anything on his own, but Luke had had to transfer out for him to transfer  _ in _ , and… and Claugh was sick and pissed and done with it.

“Don’t sweat it,” he said. “I’ll handle it.”

-

Handling it meant dragging Ryner into the stairwell after he got out of Sion’s office looking waaay too satisfied. Claugh thought of what Calne had said and tried not to look too green.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, running around two-timing people like that,” Claugh said, and started winding up to bat. 

“H-huh?”

“Don’t give me that shit!” It was more of a snarl, this time. “Did you think you were being subtle or something? The whole office knows about you! I have no idea how an idiot like you actually managed to hide an affair!” 

"Wait - me?  _ You're _ trying to accuse  _ me _ ? You - that's rich, coming from you!"

Whatever he expected to hear, that wasn’t it. That wasn’t even remotely it. Not even on the candidate list. Claugh stopped, and gaped, and then started advancing on him.

"The hell's that supposed to mean?!"

Ryner spluttered, and glared, and doubled down. "You're the one who's fucking around here, obviously! 'The whole office knows about you' -  _ no, _ the whole office knows about  _ you _ ! Does Luke - no, wait, this is totally why Luke transferred out, isn't it?!"

Claugh's jaw dropped. And that was when Ryner decided to take a swing at it.

It wasn't like he hadn't been ready to throw down for Sion, and Ferris, and that poor wife that Sion used to never shut up about, but the situation was rapidly turning on its head and he didn't want to get fired over nothing. So he dodged and grabbed Ryner's wrist.

"Gah! Don't try to shut me up by putting on moves, I'm married you know!"

_ Putting on _ \- what the fuck, Claugh had only grabbed his wrist! Did he like being manhandled that bad?!

"Don't make this about me and Luke," Claugh said, even as he rushed to re-examine everything he'd been so sure of previously. "Not until you tell me what the hell is with you and Sion!"

"Wha - huh?" Ryner blinked. "Me and Sion?"

"Yeah. You know it looks like you're cheating on Ferris with him, right?" And sounds like. Very explicitly sounds like, from Calne's description.

Ryner was blinking faster and faster. "That's - wow," he managed. "I wasn't expecting that."

He sounded so genuinely surprised - and he can't have  _ possibly _ thought he was being subtle - that Claugh decided to help him out. Walk him through it, like he was a dumb intern and not supposed to be Luke's replacement - and like he hadn't just said something he really shouldn't have about Luke, too. Claugh could be generous. "Well, what did you expect, then?"

"It's, uhhh."

Ryner hemmed and hawed a bit, but Claugh was losing patience and his glower was only strengthening. Finally, Ryner couldn't take the pressure and burst.

"Look, I was expecting you to accuse me of cheating on  _ Sion _ with  _ Ferris _ , okay?!"

Now it was Claugh's turn to blink. 

"But you - "

"It's happened before!" Ryner said, just a bit defensively. It was almost the most feeling that Claugh had heard out of him, but that time with Sion was still at the top of the list. "Not that I was, but it's happened!"

Yeesh, he can't imagine. Claugh had thought that it was sketchy how Ryner  _ didn't _ touch his wife like a husband should, since he seemed to be saving up all the touches for his boss, but…

"So you're not married to Ferris," Claugh said.

"Yes."

"So you're actually married to Sion," Claugh said.

"Yes!"

But Sion had been very clear about going home to a  _ wife _ , and here Claugh was, yelling at the wrong guy. "Is it like, a common-law marriage?" Not that he knew much about that kind of thing. He was just bored and reading about it one day. Claugh definitely didn't have any reason to research it, particularly. "'Cause, uh, I think I have some bad news for you."

"...what," Ryner said, looking extremely wary. Claugh felt for him, he really did. Well. Maybe not as much as he'd feel for him if the guy wasn't so annoying. "Is this about Lucile? Because Sion's not cheating on me with him or anything, that's come up before, too. Erises are just like that." 

Claugh actually hadn't seen Lucile and Sion in the same room together since years ago, but he acknowledged that the Erises did seem to be drama magnets. Still, "Sion has a wife. Like. He was very clear about that part. The wife."

Ryner was reddening faster than Claugh had ever seen, and he'd walked in on Calne with way too many different women. "Guh," Ryner said.

"I, uh, I could go beat him up, I guess?" Claugh offered. It was pretty half-hearted, though. "I mean, I did come ready to punch you. And also him by association."

"Nnh," Ryner said. He was getting to be dangerously red. Claugh took a closer look to make sure he was still breathing, and was surprised to see that he actually looked, uh…

…was he less upset than embarrassed? He leaned in a bit more, but Ryner scuttered back.

"I'm not  _ hitting _ on you, sheesh," Claugh said. Just how scummy did this guy think he was, seriously? He even offered to beat their boss up and everything. "Wait, did you know already? Is that why you're making that face?  _ Dude _ ."

Before Claugh could seriously consider feeding him a knuckle sandwich, Ryner turned around and started banging his head against the wall. It was shocking. Mostly because this was the first time Claugh had seen Ryner's back not facing either the wall or Sion's hand, so maybe the guy really was upset? Gah, what a headache.

"Dude," Claugh tried again.

"Go away."

"I can't just do that, this is serious!"

"Go awaaay."

If Luke was here it'd be easier. He was always good at handling both children and idiots. But if Luke was still here then Ryner wouldn't be, and there wouldn't be the need for it… probably? He wasn't totally clear on who was having affairs or when or where.

Ryner mumbled something that Claugh couldn't catch. 

"Speak up, you idiot."

He mumbled louder, but it wasn't any easier to decipher.

"Come on, spit it out!"

"I said it's a roleplay thing!!"

"…"

Oh, yeah, that'd be pretty embarrassing.

Other people were starting to poke their heads into the hall. Claugh dragged Ryner down a flight of stairs and took a quick check around the stairwell just to be safe.

"Well, uh," he said, and stopped. And coughed. And kept going, because Luke would give him a disappointed look if he were here and Claugh didn't see this through, no matter how much he regretted getting involved. "I'm glad no one's fucking around!" Even if the alternative is finding out way too much about his boss. "I'm going to, uh, head on up, I have some files I need to - "

"Hold on," Ryner said, voice low and serious despite the remaining blush. "No, you're going to explain to me what you mean by saying something like 'no one's fucking around' when you've got… whatever the hell it is you've got going on with Calne,  _ and _ I know about you and Luke. The guy never shuts up about you."

Claugh's heart skipped three beats. One was for Calne. One was for Luke. And the last was also for Luke, who apparently  _ talked about him that much  _ even to guys like this asshole.

This asshole, who wasn't going anywhere.

"Well?" Ryner said, glowering and crossing his arms. For a moment, Claugh thought it was kind of - 

Nope! No way! 

But Ryner seriously wasn't going to just let him go. This bitch. There was no way he'd buy it if Claugh said he and Calne weren't involved, either, because Calne was a little shit and there was too much to explain that Claugh couldn't be assed to explain, and in any case Calne deserved to have something come back to bite him in this case. "Look, Luke knows, it's a whole thing, it's fine," Claugh said. "If you want details ask Calne, he's the one at the center of this whole arrangement."

It wasn't like he wanted to look back, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted to know if he gave Ryner half as much a headache as Ryner had been giving him. From the carefully blank face Ryner was making, eyes closed, well…

Yeah, that’d probably do it.

At least he got _something_ out of all this.


End file.
